“Affordable” healthcare
It's open enrollment season for benefits at my employer. Every year I elect to set aside money in a healthcare Flexible Spending Account (FSA). Pre-tax money is taken out of my paycheck to fund this account that is used to pay for uncovered medical costs (co-pays, deductibles, etc.). In essence it takes the money you spend on such medical bills and makes it non-taxable. It makes healthcare slightly more affordable.
This year I elected to set aside $1800 and quickly ran out as my son now requires a whole bunch of special therapies that aren't covered by insurance. So I was going to set aside the maximum allowed by my employer ($4,000) for 2013 but I just found out that the maximum is now $2500.
The reason is that federal law has now capped such contributions. The law in question is the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act otherwise known as Obamacare.
That's right folks the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act makes healthcare more affordable by making it more expensive!
Nancy Pelosi was right, we really did need to pass the bill before we would find out what was in it.
This is the tip of the iceberg, Henry. Now with Obamacare securely in place we will see the proliferation of "Accountable Care Organizations". These will squeeze out independent practitioners, and will force even small physician groups, to ally themselves to a hospital system and force us at best into Kaiser type medicine. AT BEST.
"Obamacare Is Still Vulnerable"
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/333040/obamacare-still-vulnerable-michael-f-cannon
[...] at 4:56 pm A couple of weeks ago I posted about how health Flexible Spending Accounts (FSAs) have been capped at $2,500 by Obamacare. The purpose of the new cap is to recover more tax revenue to pay for other [...]